


Avatar Tulok

by DerAndere



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Swamp Avatar AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-12 07:47:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29381580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DerAndere/pseuds/DerAndere
Summary: Home for my thoughts about the Avatar who follows Aang in my AU. Drawings, ficlets, whatever comes to mind.
Kudos: 2





	1. The Woman In The Caves (Isn't Real)

Tulok had been a few months shy of a year when the woman in the caves had first started appearing, too small still to remember a time in which nobody whispered about her all autumn long, too young by far to remember the only time she’d stepped foot into any of their settlements. 

Puja remembers, though, very well, and Akna does, too, for the most part, and Rupa pretends to, as well, just to hold it over his head like she always does with everything. They tell him about her ghostly eyes and strong step, and none of them insist she is a spirit, though many of the other children – and even some of the adults – do. 

“They’re idiots”, Puja says, waving her hand and shaking her head when her friends tell scary stories and Tulok hides under her arm. “She was real, trust me.” 

“Spirits are real”, he whispers with wide eyes. 

“Course they are.” 

She clucks her tongue. 

“That’s not what I meant. Spirits are real in a diff’rent way than you and I, and she wasn’t. She belonged where we belong. But even if she’s a spirit, I don’t think she’s evil. She wouldn’t have minded her business in those caves for so long if she were.” 

“Maybe she’s waitin’”, Ya drawls from the other side of their fire and wiggles his fingers. He’s grinning even as Puja shoots him an annoyed look. “The woman in the cold, dark caves. Waitin’ for just the right moment t’ strike, just the right person t’ enter her realm. Maybe she’s waitin’ for … you!” 

And Akna jumps when his finger lands on her, even if she doesn’t believe in his stories, and Tulok buries himself deeper into Puja’s side. 

“You’re terrible”, his middle sister grumbles. 

Ya laughs. 

“Just waitin’ for you t’ come t’ close to her caves, and then – bam! – she’ll suck you in and eat you up in a second.” 

Akna sticks her tongue out at him. 

“She’s not even a spirit.” 

“Proof it, then.” 

Which he shouldn’t have said, for Tulok’s sake if not for anyone else’s. 

Because of course she hears him, smirking still, and immediately decides that is just what she needs to and wants to and will do, and she can’t go alone, of course not. She has to drag Puja with her, who’s supposed to be watching Tulok and also can’t say no. 

So, that’s what they do the next day, Akna walking in the front, Puja behind her with a whining Tulok on her back, and Rupa behind them, because she refuses to be left behind, refuses to be left out. 

Their mother isn’t home to stop them, somewhere on her own trek through the swamp to find an exceedingly rare herb, and their father hasn’t been home for months, though he should be back soon, and Tulok, hanging from his sister’s back, wishes not for the first time that Pa would’ve taken them with him. 

They wouldn’t be chasing spirits, then, and he really would’ve liked to see the snow. 

“Can’ we just go home?”, he whines. 

“No”, Akna says. 

“We coulda just _left_ you home”, Rupa says. 

“Nu-uh, you couldn’.” 

“Yeah, we could.” 

“Mama would be angry with you.” 

“Mama’s not here.” 

“Enough”, Puja says, because her brother’s yammering is very loud in her ear, and shuts them both right up. “We’re all going, we’ll find probably nothing or an old woman, which is basically the same, and then we’ll be back home before Mama’s back. Easy’s that.” 

“I don’ wanna go.” 

“Yeah, you said, Tu. You’re going, though, and there’s no reason to be scared, okay? There’s no evil spirit.” 

“But–”

“But if there is, we’ll protect you.” 

She sighs. 

“Right, guys?” 

“Speak for yourself”, Rupa mumbles, and Akna snorts, but says: “Obviously we will. Rupa, too.” 

Tulok tightens his grip on Puja’s neck, pouting, and though she grunts, she doesn’t protest, even as his chin digs into her shoulder, deep and deeper with each step they wade further through the murky waters of their home. His eyes are drooping soon, the slow sway of his sister’s steps lulling him into a light almost-sleep. He can hear Akna humming still, but he doesn’t know that it is Akna humming, can hear a bird screaming behind them, but doesn’t remember its name. 

He’s good at remembering, usually, at recognizing, he listens when his mother talks and tells him which animal to avoid, which plants not to touch, which parts of the swamp better not to step foot in. Some of them are more dangerous for the unformed mind – and sometimes anybody – than others, and children are taught early, lest they be lured away by a restless spirit or a stray thought. 

Rupa groans. 

The boy blinks. 

“Are we there yet?”, Rupa whines and Tulok yawns. 

“You’d know it if we were.” 

“Not long anymore, though.” 

So they trudge on, past high trees, all the same at first glance, through seemingly endless green, but they have never seen anything but this, never been surrounded by anything but green and same-trees, so where a stranger might get lost and turned around, they know exactly where to set their feet. 

Tulok wonders for how long he’d dozed off when, true to his sister’s words, the caves come into view not fifteen minutes later, or that’s how much time he guesses has passed, anyway, and something tugs on his heart, and his stomach twists. 

“I wanna go home”, he says, and means it, tugging on Puja’s hair. 

“We’re here now”, she retorts, not unkindly, but certainly annoyed. 

She lets go of his legs and he dangles from her back from a second in surprise before falling to his feet and crossing his arms over a scrawny chest, pouting once more. 

“I won’ go in.” 

“You don’t hafta, chicken”, Akna says and pats his head even as he tries to duck her hand. “Just wait here, and be our look-out.” 

“I’m not a chicken!” 

“Yeah, you are.” 

“Nu-uh!” 

“Yu-uh!” 

“Nu-”

“Do you wanna be look-out or not?” 

Akna raises her eyebrows, and then a second later, so does Rupa, as Puja rolls her eyes in exasperation like only an older sister could. 

“I _wanna_ go home.” 

Arms still crossed, he glowers up at them, and from within the caves, someone calls for him – something, something, there is no one in there, and maybe even nothing –, so he shuffles from foot to foot, just a little, undermining his would-be stern demeanor; not that any of his sisters care, either way. 

“I feel weird.” 

“Go behind a tree.” 

“Not like that.” 

He stomps a foot.

Rupa rolls her eyes. 

“Just wait out here”, Puja says. “We’ll be back in a minute, promise.” 

They’re not. 

Of course not. 

Big sisters can’t be trusted. 

He watches them walk into the cave and be swallowed by shadows just a moment later, and then he stands and waits and stands some more, and time passes, a lot of it, minutes and minutes, more than one definitely, hours, probably, and they don’t step out of the cave again. 

He hasn’t heard their steps echoing from the stone walls in forever. 

He doesn’t _want_ to go in after them, doesn’t _want_ to give into the tugging, the pulling, the call of the caves, but when an hour has ticked by – or five minutes, but what difference is there between the two in the mind of a nervous young boy –, he does. 

Straightens his back, calls out for his sisters once, and then enters the caves. 

Darkness envelopes him soon. 

Sooner, still, the path before him forks. 

Always go left in a labyrinth, Uncle Due says, and this is as close to a labyrinth as Tulok has come in his life, so he thinks for a moment which hands he uses to hold his spoon and then turns that way. 

His fingers brush along the clammy walls, the only thing guiding him, and his heart drums in his throat, his body vibrates. 

He doesn’t like these caves. 

Maybe this is exactly where he needs to be. 

“Rupa?”, he calls, too nervous to shout, and his voice bounces from the walls, shakier with each echo. “Akna? Are you here? Puja? Hello?” 

He stands and blinks and scratches at the wall, collecting dirt under his nail. 

Pa would make him clean his hands long and hard before dinner if he were here. 

Mama won’t care; a bit of dirt cleans the stomach. 

Right now, he’s half-sure he won’t ever eat dinner again, so it doesn’t matter, either way. He’s already hopelessly lost in the darkness, he won’t ever leave this cave again. 

“Hello?”, he says again. 

And jumps when an old voice replies. 

“And who would you be, little one?” 

His eyes take a moment longer to catch who’s spoken and they widen considerably once they have landed on the woman not too far down the path, not much more than a silhouette in here. 

“The Lady in the Caves”, he breathes. 


	2. Tulok and the Lady in the Caves




	3. Avatar Tulok and Yui




End file.
